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Miami’s zone defense is so unconventional that Florida State men’s basketball coach Leonard Hamilton had to go deep into his memory bank on Tuesday afternoon to remember the last time he faced a similar one.

“The last one might have been when we went to the Final Four in 1978 (at Kentucky) and faced Jud Heathcote and Michigan State,” Hamilton said with a laugh. “He played kind of a similar match-up zone. It’s hard to teach and it’s hard to execute. And that’s why a lot of people don’t use it.

“But they’ve done a good job with it.”

The Hurricanes’ defense is certainly ahead of their offense at this point, as Jim Larranaga’s squad has expectedly struggled in replacing stars like Shane Larkin, Reggie Johnson and Durand Scott off last year’s ACC Championship team.

Miami is just 9-6 on the season, 1-2 in the ACC and is 328th in the nation (out of 351 teams) in scoring at 63.5 points per game. But that doesn’t mean tonight’s game will be an easy one for the Seminoles. Not at all.

The Hurricanes have won four of their past five games, including a 63-57 win at North Carolina their last time out. The only loss during that stretch was a 49-44 slugfest at Syracuse on Jan. 4 — a game they led with just four minutes remaining.

The No. 2 Orange, who are still undefeated, were flummoxed by that match-up zone defense and shot just 36 percent for the game.

“It has man-to-man principles,” Hamilton said. “That’s why they call it a ‘match-up.’ But it’s really a zone, where one guy is matched up with the ball and everybody else is kind of clogging the lane. And if you’re not aware of that philosophy, it could be a challenge to you.

“Obviously it was very challenging to a very good Syracuse team. … And obviously it was a challenge to the University of North Carolina. They really create some problems.”

The Hurricanes are currently 10th in the nation in scoring defense. Much of that is attributed to the effective zone, of course, but they are also 345th in the country in possessions per game. So the Seminoles know Miami is going to try to slow down the game as much as possible.

That’s just how the Hurricanes play.

“The mindset going into the game has to be (ball) reversals,” sophomore guard Montay Brandon said. “A lot of reversals to get open driving lanes and open shots. On defense, we’ve got to play defense for the whole shot clock.”

Florida State (11-4, 2-1) is currently third in the nation in field-goal percentage defense, so it’s not as if the offensively challenged Hurricanes are likely to wear out the scoreboard tonight in Coral Gables.

But that’s not their goal anyway.

They want to frustrate opponents with a ball-control offense and a confusing defense. And points are going to be at a premium once again for FSU, which has already played the top two teams in the country (Clemson and Virginia) in scoring defense to start the ACC season.

“We’ve definitely got to capitalize on our opportunities,” Brandon said. “We want to get out to a big lead because teams like that struggle when you get up on them early.”